1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to improvements in powered circular saws, and, more particularly, to improvements in apparatus for carrying such circular saws for the relatively high speed cutting of an adjacent workpiece transverse to a longitudinal axis of the workpiece.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In many industrial applications, the high speed transverse or cross cutting of elongated lumber, timber or other workpiece is required. One example of such cutting requirement is in the manufacture or production of timber or boards of predetermined or uniform length. For example, in some industrial processes, continuous lengths of board may be automatically produced in processes requiring periodic cut-off operations to achieve uniform board lengths. One such elongated board production process and apparatus is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,927,705, J. Y. Cromeens et al., assigned to the assignee hereof, and which discloses means and method for finger-jointing pieces of lumber to produce a continuous length of wood which can be cross cut to form boards or pieces of lumber of uniform length.
In this and other applications in which a circular cut-off saw is employed, often times the saw is arranged at a fixed work station, and as the lumber or workpiece to be cut is moved past the saw, periodically the saw is moved with a linear motion perpendicular to a longitudinal axis of the workpiece and directly into the center of a face of the workpiece. In such operations, the cutting by the saw begins at the central location in the workpiece and progress laterally outwardly in opposite directions from the point of intial saw contact. As the saw blade progresses into the workpiece from the center toward the edges, the load upon the saw increases to a maximum level prior to the saw cutting or breaking through the opposite face of the workpiece. It can be seen that with sawing apparatuses of this type, a saw blade of diameter larger than the width of the workpiece to be cut must be used, since the blade must be passed completely through the workpiece beginning at the central location.
Also, since the saw blade is of larger diameter than the smaller blade enabled by the present invention, as below described, a larger flywheel effect is experienced requiring longer times to coast to a stop after use or in system shut-down operations.